The Guardian, 21 February
Matthew Norman visits La Buvette, Richmond, Surrey
Writing on the day the snow paralysed the capital's transport system, I must abandon a scheduled assault on the Most Scintillatingly Original Metaphor prize at the forthcoming British Press Awards. It had been my plan to break new ground by observing that superb and astoundingly cheap restaurants are like London buses in that you wait ages for one... Perhaps your psychic powers will do the rest. The point is that while restaurants that mingle quality with affordability are very rare, by happenstance two have arrived in convoy. Bumper to bumper with last week's beauty, The Sir Charles Napier, comes La Buvette, tucked away up an alley in the perplexing outer London culinary desert of Richmond. How so affluent a suburb went so long without a brilliant neighbourhood joint I can't explain, but it certainly has one now.
La Buvette - review in full>>
The Independent, 21 February
Tracey MacLeod visits Terroirs, London WC2
The flow of press releases announcing new restaurant openings has slowed to a trickle. Planned launches have been aborted before take-off, and roll-outs hastily rolled back in. As the recession bites, restaurants around Britain are closing their doors – around 100 in January alone, according to a recent report in The Independent – taking with them the pension plans of well-known figures such as Antony Worrall Thompson and Jean-Christophe Novelli. Even for an industry with a perennially high churn rate, these are turbulent times. So how has a small wine bar, which opened last autumn with almost no publicity, somehow become the hit of the moment? Tucked away in commuter-land between Trafalgar Square and The Strand, down one of those side streets that will always owe more to the Lyons Corner House than Lyon, Terroirs is packing them in.
Terroirs – review in full>>
The Observer, 22 February
Jay Rayner visits Piazza by Anthony, Leeds
Anthony Flinn doesn't do exuberant, at least not in person. If being taciturn were an Olympic sport, he could win medals. On first meeting it can be mistaken for diffidence or even boredom. It is neither of these. He's just quiet, reserved, and prefers to make his point on the plate. I have long expressed my admiration for his flagship restaurant, Anthony's, in Leeds, where the menu draws on but is not beholden to his experience at El Bulli. Michelin's continued refusal to recognise what he's doing there blunts their reputation, not his. I was therefore disappointed last year when I had to give his brasserie in Flannels, a Leeds fashion store, a less than glowing review. Which in turn makes it all the more gratifying that the Flinn family's latest venture is so impressive. My only fear is that it's a little too impressive for the current economic circumstances - because the rather Beverly Hills-named Piazza by Anthony isn't a mere restaurant. It's a bleedin' empire, a gastronomic army of occupation. Here on the basement floor of the old Corn Exchange, they have created the sort of place that will make anyone with an overly developed interest in their lunch wet their knickers.
Piazza by Anthony – review in full>>
The Sunday Telegraph, 22 February
Zoe Williams visits the Hoste Arms, Burnham Market, Norfolk
The Hoste Arms is an absolutely picture-perfect country pub at the front with a wonderful cosy restaurant to the side. Out the back there’s more informal, Sunday afternoonish seating, under a modern but somehow eternal conservatory roof. They are very proud of their success in taking a beautiful old English building, ramping up its chic and making it comfortable – legitimately so. They could run a masterclass in it. Booking a table is hell on toast, but in the bar it’s first come… not exactly first served, but certainly served at some point. A great fire roars in the grate, and spaniels are nose to nose. Can’t you just hear the gigantic 'but’? The place is terrific, the food – when it’s good, when it comes – is terrific, but I’m sorry to say it is not always good. I thought an hour between starter and main course was excessive, but probably, if we’d had a newspaper instead of a toddler, it would have passed somewhat faster.
The Hoste Arms – review in full>>
By Janet Harmer